Thanks for bringing this to attention of the group and your kind words. I havent checked group mails for past couple of months. Yesterday i was told about these mails.
The letter was handed over to Vikatan in person by Ram and vikatan passed it to Madhan. Also, it was given to Mr.Iraiyanbu when he met Dr.Kalaikkovan last week in Trichy. At that time, Iraianbu said lot of rejoinders were received from readers.
We dont think vikatan will publish them. They already refused to publish our letter on Udaiyaloor pallippadai.
Dear Kalavathy madam and Nandhakumar,
There are lot of solid evidences to write tamilnadu history. It is us who refuse to look at them. Do you mean the works of K.A.Neelakanda Sasthiri, T.V.Sadhasiva Pandaraththaar, M.Rajamanickanaar, K.R.Srinivasan, etc are not authentic? They also used the same so called 'not recorded efficiently' evidences. After their era, lot of new findings were out and we have much more data to write our history perfectly. Those new findings definitely give better information than indian summer and mangoes. If possible, please read 'Kaala aaraaychi' by Dr.M.Rajamanickanaar to understand how the chronology is fixed for tamil kings and literatures.
> > We dont think vikatan will publish them. They already > refused to publish our letter on Udaiyaloor > pallippadai.
people are rather hesitant to publish a contradictory view. there has been enough discussions in ponniyin selvan group last week to literally demolish the CHOLA PASS THEORY mentioned in a very knowledgable article in Varalaru.com will varalaru.com publish our views which are contradictory to theirs?
In no way, I am denying or turning a blind eye in the richness of our history & culture.
A simple question on the Udalayur pallipadai, why cannot we as a group file a PIL saying that JV is publishing a wrong news item there by misleading people? This can definitely pull them up. The information on this PIL can then be sent to competitors of JV and Vikatan group. what say?
I dont think madan was sarcastic at all. its a sub concious cry of anguish. the more I think of it the more I think he could have been right
dont forget nanda. mandan has his own achivements. his one book vanthaarkal vendraarkal has sold more copies than all the titles of all the historians kamal mentions. thats no mean achievement. his contribution to history is that he took it into the houses of the common man. if you read the books of these historians you will understand they are not for the common man. referenced and cross referenced. madans book was the simplest presentation of an era. I am sure he would have jumped on an opportunity write a good book about the cholas and it would have been a bigger best seller. but he has realised one cant. and as one of the sharpest minds in todays society we should read more into his answer.
his reference to mangoes on jahangirs breakfast table was a challenge. they have recorded even the king's breakfast. what do you really know about your kings. on the contrast our bunch of historians still quote poetry and hearsay stories and co incidences in words( like chola pass) to substantiate. we dont realise how funny it is to a TRUE historian.
frankly we cant write more than a page on each battle of RRc.we dont even know when he died. we assume the year when his edicts stopped appearing. a similar study of such a great king in similar year ( for example william 1 of england) has enough matter to write a dozen volumes.
and the contradictions. even the paintng assumed for long to be RRc above the big temple is being identified as somebody else by the esteemed historians of this group. whereas the copper plates say he was old enough to sacrifice the kingdom for his uncle a stone edict in thiru koviloor suggests he may have been just a baby when his father died.
pazhuvettaraiyar is a big man for us because we love PS. but it is just a chance that you got their lineage intact.and there have been a thousand clans like pazhuvur. but the major things are still unanswered. I can tell you, inspite of all the rheotoric on behalf of the varalaaru team you cant write an authentic book about RRC with more than 24 pages with evidence available and can be coraborated by other sources. even that may be difficult. SEASONS PUBLISHING did a book on kings of india and while all other kings are written about with solid evidence the author had lifted RRc's story from ponniyin selvan. if we start seeing history as a science just like physics and chemistry it will not allow us to have a needless sentiment. this sentiment is what helps a lot of people go around in the clothing of historians. venketesh
in a few temples around thondai nadu we have chola inscriptions of Raja raja in the walls of the inner sanctum. photos of them have been published in our group photos section. also there is an edict in each of these temples by one ' THIRUBUVANACHAKRAVARTHI GOPALA THEVAR" have you people heard of him? do we take hime to be a emperor just because his edicts mention him as lord of the three worlds. he was a local chieftan in the naik period. it was then that i realised some edicts could be as sychophantic as poetry. venketesh
this reminds me of the scene in Imsai Arasan, where Vadivelu is posing for a painting of himself but with the body of a wrestler. He says "Varalaaru miga mukkiyam amaichare". The kings of those eras would surely have exaggerated a lot when describing thier victories in kalvettu and poems. They would have noted down thier victories but would have conveniently forgotten to mention thier failures. I would like to know whether all Kalvettus are like this or how do we authenticate that the kalvettu is historical account and not an exaggeration by the sculptor to win gold coins from the emperor? If we are not able to trust kalvettu,poems then on what do we base our theories upon?The Copper plates? Doesn't this mean Madan is right? Would it be possible for the people who are writing against Madan in this group to prove that thier theories are based on findings which are more authentic than poems and kalvettus? Can anybody list them?
> If we are not able to trust kalvettu,poems then on what do we base our > theories upon?The Copper plates? Doesn't this mean Madan is right?
> some copper plates I remember from which chola lineage is determined traces their history from the sun. true all our atoms came from the sun. but isnt that too much. we cant even directly and honestly connect the early cholas with the later cholas. the gap is 500 years. its not the medium that counts, its the sponsor. whether its copper plates, or olai suvadi or kalvettu the man who sponsors the writing gets a lions share of the publicity. kamban himself compared major charecters in his ramayana to sadayappa vallal who sponsered his daily expenses.
recently i attended a book release function. Vaali's poems on karunanithi. 5 poets recited their poems on the cm. pa vijay, palani barathi and vaali included. for somebody new to have beleived the 5 poets would have made them feel the tamil world is surviving only because of his endevour. I thought in this modern age this sychophancy works. how it must have been in those days.
Madan was definitely sarcastic. Especially when he mentions about poets that they praised the kings for money and drinks when there is no need for Madan to hang on unreliable evidences. There is a solid evidence in these poems that the king and the poet are contemporaries and this is big lead to find contemporaries.
Why do you take it as a pesimistic approach? Why cant we try to answer these question? I am no way possess any knowledge in this subject compared to the stalwarts in this group, and I do have a lot of confidence on our rich and long lasting culture and history, but when it comes to writing it down, we have to accept some shortcomings.
We should admit that we dont have all the evidences to write Tamil history. WE do have a lot of them but they are still not making the ALL the needed stuff. I look it on a different perspective. I have told this to Venkatesh a lot of times...our history is closely tied with Religion. As per our religion nothing is stable and everyone accepted it. Everyone had high regards for god and not for humans. Thats why none of our ancestors showed much importance to human life by recording the history, but recorded the lives of saints (eg.periya puranam) and sang the glory of god (tirumurais)...
> Venkatesh, > > Listing the challenges in a pesimistic way, is it not > Madan's way?
Hi Natajan, if you stir up your memories you will know this topic did not arise after madans answer. we spoke about this earlier. you and me. in kanchi hotel chingelpet when we had all gone on that trip last year during the lunch we had the same argument . i almost remember the words. the discussion was what do we really know about RRC.his birth? his death? and the time in between.
well, what do we think are RRcs greatest achievements? i as a staunch shaivaite woul rate finding of the thirumurais in chidambaram as no 1. an architecture lover would rate building the big temple. a ponniyin selvan fan would rate his sacrifice of the throne to uthama as his greatest achievement. pinnacle of sacrifice is how the translated version of PS calls it.
we all however agree that these three are the greatest achievements possible in one man's lifetime.
yet they too are clouded in doubt and contreversy. BIG TEMPLE why should the upper chambers be incomplete( RRC was a perfectionist- rememeber). why was this temple and tanjore almost abandoned soon after RRC's death. THIRUMURAI- there are so many theories as to the finding of thirumurais. now historians claim the event itself is a legend or that rrc was not involved. SACRIFICE FOR UTHAMA- there are kalvettu evidences in thirukoviloor suggesting that RRC could have been a baby when his dad died. this could perhaps explain a lot of things on what he was doing during uthama's reign.he was propably a kid.
its not that we dont have a history. we have a great one. but then the lacuna in explaining them hurts. you are a historical fiction writer too. how easy do you think gathering info is?
hi; looking at the lighter side of things its really quite funny that the king who the time to build some of the biggest structures in the ancient world, conquer far away lands dint have time to just sit down and write about all this. All he had to do was spend a month or so during his final years in writing or sculpting his life. I find this very very wierd. He dint even have to do it himself he could have got somebody to do it. Looks like even RRC did not know how great he was and how the future generations would admire him.
The same mistakes are being made even today. Lets compare the ancient empires to the business empires of today. Almost every European or American businessman or CEO (the really famous ones and the not so famous ones) take time out to write books about how they got there, thier life, etc. Jack Welch, Gates, Ricardo Semler, Sam Walton, etc. This way people learn about thier exploits, mistakes, etc.
Can you name one Indian businessman who has written a book of his exploits? Recently Kokila Ben launched a photograph collection of Dhirubhai Ambani's life but nothing else. Even the incredible Mr. Narayana Murthy has written very little about his life. Maybe im not aware of a few biogrpahies on Indian businessmen but the truth is the cupboard is bare when we cmpare with the Eurpeans and Americans. Thank god Dr.Kalam took time out for recording this. Even in Indian cricket Sunil Gavaskar has a biography and maybe a few other cricketers but absolutely nothing from some of the most incredible talents like GRV (i cant remember reading even an interview from this artist), Chandra, etc. Looks like we haven't learnt anything from our past.
Am just wondering, were the north indian greats like Asoka, Harsha Vardhan, had properly documented evidences for their conquest. How the pre muslim indian kings life's were documented?
mere selling in hundreds & thousands of a book > does mean it is more authenticated than the books > which sell less. > mandan has his own achivements.
Hi thats a good point. we do have art movies that get awards and dont run a day in the theatres. but will you disregard the achievement of rajinikant or mgr movies that run for a year.
we are not comparing the historians and their achievements. but madan's book stands high on the podium as the highest selling history book in tamil.and even if the tens of thousands who bought it are idiots an achievement is an achievement.
and authentication about vanthaarkal vendraarkal is not the issue here, madan has quoted from recognised sources. the very aspect that he refuses to do a book without materiel to substantiate it shows his commitment. we may not agree with him but we need to listen to him
Its good to hear that you are standing your ground. I am still wondering about one missing link. As per historical sources, there were the Thiru mandira olaikarars, who would write down the various requests of the kings. Over the years, there would have been thousands and lacs of Olais on various instructions, commands, and notifications and just like the current gazette system used by the government. It is definitely possible that these olais would survive the test of time, at least some would have definitely made it. Its just that we have not identified the source of these olais. These would possibily be safe in the private collection of many individuals or groups or people or society. Its just we need to find the source.
Just another possibility, that we would have materials that we have overlooked ourselves. These would be authentic sources in the lines of what we need to validate and make use of.
I dont dis agree that we have had a fabulous history. at least in the later history of tamil nadu we have had great conquerors. it was the momentum that they provided that enabled our society to survive a millienium.
and history is not a static science. when authentic discoveries are made changes have to be made in text books. but unfortunately for us chola history has remained static after nilakanda sastri's time. it would be useful to debate what has been discovered after him.no earth shaking discovery as people would lead you to beleive. how do you imagine rrc. till i read ponniyin selvan i imagined him from sivaji's movie. after ponniyin selvan i imagine him as a gentle king who hurts no one. even refuses to plunder the country he enslaves for food. he would rather let his soldiers starve. sometimes a true history lover fels like screaming " will the real RRC please stand up?"
1) When the grand father of Tamil ( Vu Ve Sa ) reached a temple that kept the library of the Pandian King Sundara Pandian, he was informed that it was just burnt into ashes as they didnt have any purpose...
2) A temple priest ( or a priestly man ) at Alwar Thirunagari ( it is a village between Tirunelveli and Tiruchendur with ancient temples ) possessed some palm leaf books and requested some scholars to take a look... No body in TN turned up, until somebody from Venkateshwara university... we dont know what was in those books,
Recently a study of palm leaf books in possession of individuals in southern districts was taken and it was a big number... we dont know what is in them.. who will spend time / money to talk to these individuals, convince them to take a scanned copy, get it read and print / publish it....
If we could get together and get the list from the govt body that did the census of palm leaf books, probably we could scan about 100 books during the summer vacation...
Is this the National palm leaf digitisation effort done by the Kanchi university also? Madan from our group or someone from our group did mention about such an activity that was/is done by Kanchi Kamakoti Univeristy also? Looks like we forgot that thread and an action that was supposed to come from that thread.
Lets be the change that we talk of. This is what Gandhi would have done, if he was in this position. We are capable of doing good things with the right direction and purpose.
Lets co-operate and take this thread into action. What would be your opinion on going after thiru mandira olais and the copper plates? It would be authentic enough to help us gleam more information that our supposed historians chose to forget and to ignore.
There is every possibility that there can be valuable resources hidden in some private collection, but practically speaking its impossible.
without proper maintenance, it will crumble to pieces in a few years. Preserving it for centuries - ruled out.
Quoting uv.ve.sa, he says in his 'en sarithiram' that when he went in search of oolai chuvadis he was pained to hear that people have destroyed thousands of palm leaves either by burning or putting them in rivers. It seems people said they followed the tradition by which the palm leaves are supposed to be destroyed.
Tamil thatha, with great anguish quotes that, this tradition of putting palm leaves in water or fire was done only when to old leaves are in the verge of destruction. People used to make a copy of the exisiting palm leaf and then destroy the old ones by putting in fire or water. But our later generations took only the half which was convinient to them (as we take all the convinient things from the west and leave out th good ones )
In this way a lot of treasure has alredy been lost.
Coming to the point of preserving the existing ones - already govt. organizations are working on it. Scanning and preserving the leaflets are not an easy joke. Whatever collection has been made, its still not yet catalogued. A three year project has been commissioned by the central govt. only to catalogue the available leaflets - like whats the name of the book, whos the author etc. After this it has to be read, deciphered, if relevant published etc. etc...
> Quoting uv.ve.sa, he says in his 'en sarithiram' that when he went > in search of oolai chuvadis he was pained to hear that people have > destroyed thousands of palm leaves either by burning or putting them
even a big part of the thiru murais on olai suvadis in the locked room at thillai were destroyed by termites. this may be the legend but then some sundarar devarams stop abruptly lending some credibility to this legend. the legend is that rrc and nambi andar nambi rescued the olai suvadis and etched them on copper.
there are 275 established devara sthalams most possibly listed by u.ve.sa. the discovery of the last two are remarkable. in one shiva temple near koradacheri somebody removed the lime plaster on the stone walls and a new devaram was in the kalvettu. this temple was added to the list. and later another devaram was discovered for a temple called kiliyanoor but the temple has not been identified.
I accept your point of veiw easwaran....nature sells less than Jeffrey archer that doesnt make archer better than all those scientists who have written in nature
our supposed historians chose to forget and to ignore.
Nanda , you make me sound like a terrorist. I have nothing against historians. have you read "Colas" by sastri. a phenomenal piece of work.( Can some one tell me why he used that spelling often?) its just that whenyou see similar histories of other nations in an equivalent period you feel frustrated. and to fill the lacuna here legends, poems and hearsay have crept in.
what do you think of france or england in comparison. we would automatically say they were babarians when we were essayists and poets. just look at the history of england and france in the time of RRC. a few years before or after. the capet dynasty of france has such a detailed history till 1350 or so and after that their geneology can be traced to the bourbons of 1700s. in england the battle of hastings. some time in 1066. there are records on what happened every hour in the battle. we dont know where rrc's battle fields were. we cant write more than three lines on any of his battle. italy, vatican, the vikings all have had pucca records during the same period.
proper recording in indian history starts with the muslim invasion. the khilgis had a daily diary of court affairs. printed books are available.
the pandyas clearly wiped out traces of the cholas.the khiljis wiped out pandya records. happens in history. khusro and wassaf of the turkish army record 512 elephants loaded with looted gold and precious stones. so it must have been a very wealthy land. but the arguments now are whether we have enough evidence to write our history completely with out referring fictional sources.
Sorry for making you feel that way... We need to understand that our resources are available and locating and tapping into resources is going to be a phenomenoal task. Are we upto task? Do we have the motivation and the commitment to do it.
You would have definitely known about the National archival mission to map the palm leaf manuscript across India. I did see only very few tamil works. There are definitely resources/societies/individuals who are officially or have personally committed to such endeavours.
Kalinga Bala had posted information on one such endeavour in virudhachalam, so why not talk to them?
I dont remember which body did that. But a list of palm leaf books and the individual address should be available with ASI, Chennai.
We can take a car, a laptop and a scanner. Go to a village / city that has maximum, talk to the village / city heads and impress upon them - knock each door that has a palm leaf book. Which ever door that opens up, we can scan the palm leaves and give it back to them. Probably we can carry a govt order or instruction to help us with that.
But who will organize such an attempt ? Need to have contacts at high places.
> u Ve Sa got a lot of palm leaf details from > mithilaipatti in > chettinad on shaivism.
Thats why I insist that Chettinad is the last resort. Hidden treasures ( ie valuable palm leaves, copper plates and the like. Not just ivories & jewellery ) could be still found in Chettinad homes. It could even change the history. How about, if we find a lost Sangam Tamil literature in a Chettinad home?
Somebody influential like you could only do it. Think about it... I'm willing to join you in this venture. I can also spend some money in this quest.
Links given below will give some information on the National Mission for Manuscripts. There was a flurry of activity in 2003/04, and manuscripts numbering in laks from Karnataka, Gujarat (maximum) and other states were identified from individuals for digitization. But now, there is not much news about its activities. Even the web sites are not updated. The most recent news I have seen, (last week), the National Centre for Performing Arts, the body entrusted with the project, froze distribution of funds to the manuscript mission, citing mal practices in withdrawal and spending. Let that be.
In the early days, there was tremendous response, and teams visited a large number of villages/towns and collected manuscripts from individuals for digitization. They were overwhelmed by the quantity of manuscripts available, all over India. The momentum slackened and there was no publicity after some time. Not sure, how the manuscripts collected and digitized will be made available with proper indexing and search facility. I doubt whether the mission can mange this, with its inertia, availability of domain specific experts and facilities.
My only sore issue is: our inability to have the evidence in a decoded printed format in our hands, is no justification to question our forefather's lack of historical sense and make fun of them. People like Madan who reach a wider reading public, must be sensitive about this.
Unless the documents are available to a large group of committed and devout researchers for study and deciphering, what ever is collected may also be lost. Only IT savvy youngsters like in this group, can find a solution for this 'himalayan' problem. Sampath
hi; just remembered something. A couple of weeks backmy father and i went to Udayalur agrahaaram for a period of 2 days. We visited most of the agrahaaram houses there. In one of the houses i saw a big bunch of really really old palm leaves. The owner is living in Chennai so the house is uninhabitated. The palm leaves were quite dusty and the owner said it contained Ramayana. It was really old. The other houses are also really old so im suer there must such leaves in the other homes. There must such leaves in other houses too. Maybe we can scan them then and there. We might be saving something.
Yes, Chettinad may be treasure-trove. Recently, in a Pothigai TV programme about old items sold by chettinad households, there was one cupboard full of palm manuscripts. Sampath
-Hi all most of the olai suvadis are chettiar accounts and transactions. the dowry of my mother was recorded in an olai suvadi and i have it.i also used to collect the eluthaanis but then i lost interest. chettinad also has some of the earliest books published in tamil. those books could be copies of the olai suvadis. but some 100 year old books have been located by my father in devakottai and i hope to see them and acquire them on 15 th and 16th of this month. i could courier them straight to v.ks house.he seems so eager. venketesh
Thats very good. Please use your influence in all Chettinad villages / cities. There could be other interestig palm leaf texts as well. The Chettiars patroned poets and scribes and also helped literature to survive the after math of the muslim invation.
Besides, how did the Chettiars maitain accounts and transactions ? Thats an interesting study. Perhaps even it could help business communities to unearth business practices, process and systems used by our ancient traders who brought so much of wealth to our nation.. who knows there could be learning for modern and future generations as well...
> > Besides, how did the Chettiars maitain accounts and > transactions ? Thats an interesting study.
You should read the book "caste and capitalism in colonial india" some of the text is on the net. i'll try to give you a link.
Perhaps > even it could help business communities to unearth > business practices, process and systems used by our > ancient traders who brought so much of wealth to our > nation.. who knows there could be learning for modern > and future generations as well... >
Dear all have really been very busy last few weeks there are just a few points I thought ill raise
1.Lack of evidence doesnt mean the theory is wrong before dismissing it.... 2. there is evidence agreed its in bits and pieces.....heard of something called TROY??? the whole history is based on Homer's writing....there are tourist spots in turkey which claim that was troy...there is an alternate group which claim Britain was troy and the whole war was for Tin..yes the metal but thats regardedas part of history Heard of King Authur the Brits celebrate his legend as history....I dont think all that bits about the Vikings and Saxons but they are proud of it and have written volumes of what is available..... We lack that commitment and we constantly criticise the ones who do it... I heard somebody say... ''success is when you built a castle out the stones thrown at you'' I think thats where we are unique and are trying to do something great HATS OFF and GOOD LUCK
When Europeans base their history on literature, thats hailed and we say we should learn from them. But Sri, there are so many Indians who say that Mahabaratha and Ramayana are just literature and cannot be treated as History. Strong belivers of Hindus will realise that they are not mere fiction but history indeed.
Lots and lots of stories are spread across the vedas, which are brushed aside as pure fiction by many pagutharivalars. Even some three years back, we had a heated argument in our group regarding vedas and many of the vedic beliefs were criticised as being pro- brahminical. Same lack of evidences were pointed out then, to subdue the supremacy of vedas.
So where we stand? are we behaving like politicians who bend the rules based on the benefits?
I am not a regular follower of Madan's qa sessions, but whatever I have read, even for the simplest of the answers a lot of research has been done. When such a learned person says something, we cannot brush aside them just like that.
I accept that we do have information in bits and pices. Many have been destroyed by rivalry, either pandya invasion or muslim invasion. My point is when Indians or the historians turn blind to accept many of the facets of Indian Hisotory/Hinduism (eg. to accept the aryan invasion theory as myth, because if accepted, Hinduism become native to India), will the same Indians or historians accept the literature or our commitment to show our supremacy?
> 1.Lack of evidence doesnt mean the theory is wrong before dismissing it...
what theory are we talking about. we all agree that the cholas were great. otherwise we wouldnt be here in the first place.
> We lack that commitment and we constantly criticise the ones who do it...
extravagant praise does a lot more damage than critiscm. I wish somebody would translate kamals answer and post it in the group. then people can decide for themselves whether it was a "Sattaiyadi for madan " that you christened it. do you beleive kamal's mail was a fit answer to madans question if you recall kamal quoted from poetry ( which was precisely what madan said) kamal was throwing around hearsay tidbits like the "chola pass" for most of the time kamal was talking about a small clan in remote tamilnadu. in what way has the geneology of the pazhuvur clan drastically shaped tamil history? in fact kamal was talking about something he was strong at. though it was not even remotely connected with the question being asked. lastly you saw kamals wordings. he asks madan " how can you say karikalan did not go to the himalayas. can you prove that he did not go?" when somebody is asking you prove a point do you ask him "can you prove its not true? thats not how true sciences operate.
the answer stirred up passions that tend to blind us. it was not a fit answer to the question asked.in fact it didnt even resemble an answer. calling it in all dramatic wordings as a "bagiranga kaditham" will not help. it should have the stuff within. everybody who has spent time on the tamil history knows there are huge lacuna. why do want to hide behind passions of patriotism. those will put us behind politicians who make their living by stirring up such stuff.
sure Sri. lots about him. and not all britons take him as a hero or even as one who existed
here's a tidbit on the king and his round table.( YOU live in a very honest country , I envy you)
The "history of arthur " by Geoffrey of Monmouth contains little trustworthy historical fact, and many scholars are tempted to agree with William of Newburgh, who wrote around 1190 that "it is quite clear that everything this man wrote about Arthur and his successors, or indeed about his predecessors from Vortigern onwards, was made up, partly by himself and partly by others, either from an inordinate love of lying, or for the sake of pleasing the Britons."
a historian of 1190 disputes the history of their greatest legend. wish we had more like him around. debate is healthy for progress. if one feared critiscm you wont go the next step.
Dear Satish I totally agree with you.. Part of the problem is Mahabaratha,ramayana and vedas are classic works andare based on history....if they are not then vyasa has one hell of a crative power... I think the problem with them to be treated as history is that they have become more than history in indian minds...as divine works..
Dear Venkat I agree that brits speak the truth and publish but as far as athe common man...arthur is still a legend.. http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/server.php?show=conProperty.316 thats the like to tintagel castle ...where visitors are welcomed with searching for arthur...
this is a part of english heritage...
I agree and disagree regarding kamls response...the sangam literature he chose was to counter the statement poets just dranke ale and wrote lies...
I agree with Chola pass evidence or lack of evidence
But I still stand my ground that a respected author should have been dismissive